Orosi’s Mariachi Cardenal gets ready for FCC High School Mariachi Festival on March 25

When Allison Girón started her freshman year at Orosi High School, a friend mentioned her sister played mariachi in high school. Girón found that “really interesting”, so she gave it a try. After all, if she didn’t like it, she would switch out.

“But I ended up really loving it and it’s really fun,” Girón said.

“So, I started playing mariachi last year as a freshman, but last year I played vihuela,” said the 15-year-old sophomore.

Girón, president of Orosi’s Mariachi Cardenal, plays the guitarrón this year.

“It’s just something about the instrument that lured me to play,” said Girón.

The difference between those two instruments? A vihuela is a small, high-pitched Mexican guitar with five strings and a ‘vaulted’ back that produces the lively rhythmic vibrancy of mariachi. A guitarrón is a deep-voiced acoustic bass guitar and serves as the bass of the group, because the mariachi ensemble has no drums or other percussion.

When asked if the guitarron was heavy, Girón said “not really like it’s just like hollow, so it’s not really heavy.”

Girón and Mariachi Cardenal will perform at the March 25 High School Mariachi Festival at Ratcliffe Stadium.

Fresno City College is bringing high school students from around the Valley and state to participate for the friendly mariachi and folklórico competition.

Other groups include McLane, Kerman, Delhi, Woodlake, Mira Monte (Bakersfield), and Roosevelt high schools. Also performing are groups from Ilusión de Watsonville, Ezequiel Tafoya Alvarado Academy in Madera, and Mariachi México de Gilroy.

Orosi mariachi band director Jonathan Gaspar has about 30 students in mariachi. For most of them, it is their first year playing in mariachi.

“A majority of the students are first-year musicians,” Gaspar said, adding that many of them have never played a guitar or never touched a violin.

Gaspar said he is glad Fresno City College is organizing the festival.

“Especially in this area I’m not really aware of mariachi competitions, but I know in other places like Texas, L.A. or Las Vegas it’s a norm because a lot of schools have mariachis,” said Gaspar. “I know that mariachis are growing more so I’m assuming and hoping that there’s going to be more competitions or opportunities to perform.”

Mariachi Cardenal’s first competition

Gaspar said this is the first mariachi competition for Orosi High.

“We don’t know what to expect. It’s more experience. We want the kids to have that experience, so we learn from it, and then we get to do it again hopefully next year,” Gaspar said.

“This is the first time to compete. Usually, I compete with my marching band. With mariachi, we just do concerts, and we’ll perform in Dinuba’s Cinco de Mayo,” Gaspar said. “But for some of them going to Fresno City and performing in this competition, being next to other mariachis, I realized that it can, it has been stressing them out or making them worry of ‘are we going to be good enough.’

“But my job as the director is to remind them that this is a learning experience. We’re going to grow from it and, you know, diamonds are built from pressure. So, we got to put a little bit of pressure to keep growing. So that’s my perspective,” Gaspar said.

“We feel it all. We’re excited, we’re nervous, we’re scared. But I’m trying to keep them on the excited side,” said Gaspar, who has directed the mariachi since 2017.

Orosi High has had a mariachi band since the mid-2000s, a program started by then music teacher Ed McCue.

Gaspar said the mariachi class meets Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, and for the past two months he has added one rehearsal after school and will move to three afterschool rehearsals a week to try to squeeze as much practice before the competition.

Violin player Samantha Alejandro joined the school mariachi “because I wanted to embrace my culture more. I like the mariachi style music and I love listening to it.”

The 17-year-old high school senior student has been playing the violin since the fourth grade and has been playing in the school mariachi since her junior year.

Alejandro is very excited about the upcoming mariachi festival.

“This is our first time actually competing and going towards other schools and having the opportunity to listen to the other high schools in person, which is very exciting,” Alejandro said, who loves playing mariachi music with all her teammates, listening, and getting to learn new music.

“At first, I was really scared about it. But now that it’s getting closer, I think like it’s just having the opportunity to be able to play. It’s just that’s really fun,” Alejandro said.

Like Alejandro, Girón is also excited about the school mariachi’s first competition.

“it’s really exciting, but I’m also really nervous,” Girón said.

Girón said one of her favorite songs to play with the mariachi is ‘El Rey’.

(A little trivia for you, ‘El Rey’ is a 1971 ranchera song by Mexican singer/songwriter José Alfredo Jiménez and one of his best-known songs which has been covered by various artist, including the late Vicente Fernández, whose version could perhaps be the best-known version of the song.)

What Girón loves most about being in mariachi is “the culture that brings and the happiness that it brings to me and like other people when we play.”

The festival – which includes food trucks, vendors and Fresno City College information for students and their families - will be at Ratcliffe Stadium from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

The mariachi competition begins at 1 p.m. sponsored by Fiesta Auto Insurance.

The folklórico line up includes Roosevelt High, Central East High, FCC Folklórico, Fowler High, Grupo Folklórico Tanguu Yu, and Washington Union High.

Tickets are $10 for adults. Children 10 years old and younger are free. Tickets can be purchased at all participating high schools, the FCC Student Activities office, and at the door. Tickets can also be purchased on Eventbrite.

Parking is free in the FCC parking structure at Blackstone and Weldon.

María G. Ortiz-Briones: 559-441-6782, @TuValleTuSalud